At a recent Emergent Gathering, Mike Clawson received a Bible in a new format, a TNIV edition from IBS, the The Books of the Bible — basically a TNIV without the chapter and verse divisions, no cross-references or paragraph headings. Just the books, set in paragraphs as they would originally have been read. He quotes from the preface, “When verses are treated as intentional units (as their numbering suggests they should be), they encourage the Bible to be read as a giant reference book, perhaps as a collection of rules or as a series of propositions.” Hell-lo! This note from the preface cuts to the heart of the way some of us have used the Bible… by referring to it as a “sword,” we somehow got the idea that we were supposed to hurt people with it.

The TNIV is a nice idea and I think illustrates a trend in how people are wanting to read the Bible — much as Eugene Petersen captured with his translation. (Yes, it’s a translation — a paraphrase is not the same thing as dynamic equivalence in translation, and it doesn’t help to wrinkle your nose when you say “paraphrase.”) But it’s the TNIV; my essential issue with the TNIV is not the “T”, it’s the “NIV” — I suppose I share Michael’s (Michael Spencer, the Internet Monk) appreciation of the NIV Study Bible’s notes more than it’s translation, which is in my estimation not a good one to which to become addicted. (Rather than a solitary viewpoint, this particular study Bible has a good set of notes from a cross-section of notable scholars on each book of the Bible.)

Following our good discussion here on Bible translations (and my history with them) not long ago, I purchased a new Bible, and I went with an NLT that has no notes, just minimal cross-references. The divisions, face it, are something of a distraction that stops the flow of your reading. I remember fairly clearly my Dad telling me that when reading the Bible, I didn’t have to read (I was reading aloud) the verse numbers. It helped. The edition I selected is a better size than what I’ve tried before too — big enough that the text is legible but smaller than the sinner-thumping study editions I’ve had in the past (and still have). I selected the NLT as a solid translation that reads nicely — I should ask Scot McKnight how prominently it featured, but the preface says that the translation was done with consideration given to how it would flow when read aloud, something that isn’t much of a consideration in most translations. As a result, the text flows well for reading in general, aloud or not.

The NLT notes, as Ben Witherington also observes, that the original intent of the texts were for oral use. Not that they’re to be taken internally, but… well, wait. Maybe that too. But significantly, the texts were read aloud and heard, not distributed for silent reading… even the few that were literate read aloud, even if they were alone. Anselm said that Ambrose was the most remarkable man he had ever met, because he could read without moving his lips or making a sound. The fact of the text’s originally-audible-only context impacts the way it can be understood, which we would do well to remember as we approach it.

Maybe I selected the NLT for some of these same reasons that I’ve loved J.B. Phillips’ excellent translation, which he began with Colossians in a bomb shelter during the London Blitz. Somehow you have to know that’s going to affect your translation — which is ever in need of an eternally timeless immediacy. Phillips’ verse divisions were imprecise, being joined when it was more suitable to do so, and set in the margins like Petersen’s. As far as I know, there exists no edition of his translation which has cross-references or study notes. (Should you find a copy of his translation in a used bookstore, I urge you to snap it up.)

I suppose I also share Michael’s enthusiasm for a literary type of study Bible (even though I’d love to see the format in another version). While we’re at it, I’d also like to see a study Bible version of the NET Bible with the full set of translator’s notes and none of the study notes, and in a smaller (carry-able!) size. It’s a nice translation with perhaps the best set of notes (see aforementioned caveat) available anywhere. Too bad the print versions aren’t very accessible. Now there would be a winning combination — the translation notes of the NET set in a flowing (verseless) format with study notes from a literary perspective. NET and/or NLT, please. JBP would be too much to ask, I know, and there’s not a complete Old Testament for it.

It seems to me as though there’s a shift going on in how we view the Bible and want to interpret it — not merely among the emerging set, but in the wider context of Christianity. It may be old news to those in “the conversation”, but I think it’s catching on. In the past, there has been a scholarly quest for exhaustive systematic knowledge about the text without a corresponding concern for its application, for allowing the text to grow in us. “Mary” puts it very well when she says, “Quiet times became study times without my realizing it.” Her astute observation after all her study and ability to dissect the original languages and explain the cultural significance of the words: “Perhaps I knew what the Bible said, but I didn’t know what God meant.” Without making a formula of it, Ed Cyzewski says, “Over the past week or two I have noticed a trend of sorts. I could say this in any number of ways, but the gist is this: the more scripture I read, the less likely I am to sin. That’s a bit simplified, since I really noticed radical differences in my state of mind, attitude, and thoughts as well.” I’ve noticed that as well. Not, you know, right now, but, er, at other times… uh, in the past. Like Mary said, I think I like many of us want to re-learn to re-read the Bible. This is not an easy task for a text with which we’ve become so familiar, but I’m finally finding I can start to see it in fresh ways again.

While I’m thinking on these things, Paul Fromont mentioned an article by Greg Jones, William Stringfellow reads the Bible. Considering our approach to “Bible study” as having been a code-phrase for (basically) saddling up the hobby horse, Paul writes that if we are to genuinely engage in Bible study with others, we must do so with an openness to being read by Scripture. “It is to be open to hearing afresh what the Spirit might be discerned as saying or directing.”

My background is still too evangelically-imbalanced, so I wasn’t previously familiar with William Stringfellow, but I got a reasonable introduction from Greg Jones’ article. In addition to noting Stringfellow’s work for justice, he writes, “Stringfellow was also a surprisingly bold critic of Mainline Protestantism’s ‘virtual abandonment of the Word of God in the Bible’ for a mess of modernistic philosophical porridge.” Continuing with Stringfellow’s assertions, Greg explains that people were neither “intimate with nor reliant upon the Word of God in the Bible, whether in preaching, in services in the sanctuaries, or in education and nurture. Yet it is the Word of God in the Bible that all Christians are particularly called to hear, witness, trust, honor and love.”

Stringfellow argued that Christians ought not primarily to think of the Bible as something to be dissected, figured out, and discussed as if it were a dead frog on a lab table – or an encyclopedia of ancient concepts. Rather, he argued that the Bible should be engaged with by living people in living ways – for in and of itself the Word of God is living and active.

Yes, to Stringfellow, the Bible is the Word of God, and as such is a thing not dead, but a Word militant, free and alive. Christians should be focused on living within the Word of God in the Bible in this world. Our primary vocation as Christians, therefore, regarding that Word of God, is to be open to it, to listen to it, and to live it – to live humanly and biblically as he would say. Yet this kind of open listening to the Word of God in the Bible – is the very thing we modern people are no longer very good at. Stringfellow says we can’t listen to the Word of God in the Bible because we are not particularly good at listening to anything outside ourselves.

This got me to thinking about the way in which modern hermeneutical methods have tended to treat the Bible systematically as though it were composed by a single author at a single point in time, despite clearly recognizing it as a multi-scribed (perhaps better than multi-authored) work composed over a period of perhaps 6,000 years. A shift away from modernist methods of Biblical study toward postmodern methods, which will have greater concern for what each author intended to say to his readers as a part of the story in which they found themselves. Perhaps this is the change in the wind. I don’t think that the quest for deeper understanding of the language, the textual criticism, and the study of the cultural milieu will or should come to an end, but we do need to learn or find ways of letting the text impact us with as much force and effect as it had for its first recipients.

Perhaps a literary reading can help with this (ESV or not)… we’ve dwelt on the minutia for so long, perhaps a literary view of the big picture will help us catch the grand themes a little better. Minutia is for dividing ourselves, grand themes are for bringing ourselves closer together. It’s easier to rejoice in the grand themes than in the minutia. The old study Bibles I’ve got all had brief book introductions, as do the critical commentary serieses serii seriesen seriess series (multiple incomplete sets, I give up) that grace my bookshelves. I’ve got old- and new- testament introductions there as well… but still the natural inclination was always to go to the note on the particular verse, as though the Bible were an encyclopedic reference work.

Stringfellow harshly criticizes Modernist literalism as a tendency which produces either an irrelevant Bible or a fundamentalist Christianity. Stringfellow would argue that the kind of Modern reductionism rampant among incredulous agnostics and credulous fundamentalists alike is false in that does not really engage with the living Word of God in the Bible. Moreover, this kind of biblical literalism is a denigration of the humanity of the reader or listener whose role in engaging the text is reduced to a passive one, and a flattening out of a text which is divinely multidimensional.

It seems to me that there’s something to this whole line of thought, and perhaps some ways in which our modernist methods of interpretation may have attempted to speak to our brains but failed to nourish our souls. In the exchange, perhaps we’ve been too quick to apply our “knowledge” of the book to the lives of others without first having had our lives changed by the book. We’ve prefer to read the book rather than letting the book read us… far too mystical a concept for moderns anyway. So am I on the right track here? How does one regain a simple love for the Bible (as Mary asked)? Does a literary view and a literary study Bible make sense? Will the eschewing of chapter-and-verse divisions help us to this end, or is it just another marketing ploy that won’t deliver as promised?

13 Comments

Peggy
on Wednesday October 10, 2007 at 2:45 pm

Bro. M.,

The Abbess also enjoys the NLT–I even have the set of dramatized CDs of it! I share some of your dislike of NIV, but resonate with the removal of peripheral stuff. Hmmm. But I was just Sunday discussing with someone that this is the very reason I have enjoyed the Reader’s Digest Bible.

Everyone always laughs when I tell them that Reader’s Digest did a condensed version of the Bible (with Bruce Metzger as the general editor, no less!) and then are shocked when I’m serious.

Reader’s Digest took the RSV and did their normal careful job of condensing each verse (not abridging, by the way) to make some of the ancient literary repetitions less cumbersome for our non-Hebrew ears… Anyway, it removes all chapter and verse and section titles…and makes reading a joy. It is amazing how much those things interfere with the ability to read straight through a book! And how much of the Bible can be read through without those distractions!

Anyway, for those who are wanting to jump on me for the “sacrilege” of this, I want you to know that I always use this version for reading through to get the big picture…which is what it is for! You can’t do “chapter and verse” study without chapters and verses ;^) So I read through with this version before I do my in-depth study…and I frequently read Phillips afterward–just to see where I came out! Love his stuff. I have one of his early editions, as well as his fully revised Student Edition–which, being more “translation” than “paraphrase” loses some of the spark. ;^(

And, for “Pastor Appreciation Month” about four years back, someone found a copy of RD’s Illustrated Edition…which is a beautiful piece of art in itself as well as the art and articles included.

A text without artificial markers! What a wonderful thing. When my flock asks me what Bible I recommend I almost always encourage them to get a simple, plain text with as few frills as possible. I am not a fan of the “study Bible” for the simple reason that people confuse the authority of scripture and the authority of commentary. I can’t tell you how many times I have someone say, “Well, my Bible says…” and they will proceed to read from some study note included. I gently chide them and ask, “Does the Bible really say that?”

I will look forward to adding a copy of this text with out chapter and verse to my bedside table.

BTW – I am currently preaching from the ESV but am a marginal fan of the NIV. Cut my teeth on KJV and every now and then I have to get my 17th century English fix. Psalms are hard to beat in the KJV. Love Peterson’s work on the Message but also understand it to be one man’s translation/interpretation.

Peggy
on Wednesday October 10, 2007 at 6:53 pm

Alright, young whipper-snapper…take a deep breath and hold it right there! The Abbess is about to get out her ruler and wrap your knuckles…

Let’s take a moment and suppose that there are some folks out here in the wide blogosphere who can’t study their Bibles in the original languages, don’t have a brilliant grasp on the varieties of literary genre or the nuances in any language, much less Hebrew or Greek…perhaps, even, those who’ve never heard of a strophe…who, for once in their lives, would like to be able to sit down to read their Bible with the hope of making it more than a chapter or two without being totally sidetracked by the numbers and notes…yada, yada, yada…who would love to be able to read, say, an entire book in one sitting and get some sense of the sweeping images with which God is revealing himself. Perhaps they might be inspired to read through the entire Bible…you know, all of it, and not just pick and choose here and there.

I would rather hand that person a copy of the RDCV and pray for the Holy Spirit to read with him–confident that it would be a help–than hand him just about anything else out there and have him put it down, confused or overwhelmed, after 10 minutes. And as much as I love Peterson, sometimes The Message gets a little distracting, too.

The missionary (yes, the Abbess was a missionary 30 years ago) part of me vividly remembers typing portions of the Psalms into the Rawang language of North Burma so that those precious brothers and sisters might be able to read its inspiring words. My cousin is the OT/Hebrew consultant involved with Wycliffe in the final stages of bringing the OT in Pijin to the people of the Solomon Islands…and the bringing of God’s word into the heart language of any people is an awesome undertaking….

Sometimes I’ve just had it with folks who, by much of the world’s standards, have everything and seem to appreciate nothing…especially where it comes to God’s Word. Sure, I must have a couple of dozen different versions of the Bible on my shelves–and I am grateful for each and every one of them. But I don’t ever forget that I am blessed and that my experience is…well…abi-normal. (Very small inside joke ;^) ) When the teachers and scholars lose sight of the reality of the masses that struggle to hear God speaking to them in some way that they can comprehend…well, I guess one might want to get nervous!

…this is part of the problem, Brother…and why so many despair of ever being able to understand what God is saying and what they are supposed to do about it. We make it too complicated to our/their peril…just as we make it too simplistic to our/their peril.

And as to your narrowly-averted snarky post (there is too much snarkiness in general, imo, everywhere–but especially in the blogosphere), I have Tyndale’s NLT Bible Alive dramatization. I find it helpful for listening with my children as well as many who have lost the desire to HEAR the Word read…and don’t even get me started on that one!

A simple love for reading the Bible…requires an equally simple format for just reading the Bible. We have to find a way through the maze….

Ouch! My knuckles are smarting too! I didn’t comment on the whole RDCV incident as I felt it spoke for itself. However, after being fairly upbraided for my scholarly uppity-ness perhaps I should give it a look. NAH. Excuse me if I’m just a little uncomfortable with the whole “cutting out parts of the scripture” idea. Echoes of Jefferson removing the parts he didn’t like. However, I am all excited about getting the Word of God into the heart language of people everywhere. E.G. the Gullah Bible. Wonderful and insightful to hear (you really have to read it out loud to get the dialect). Kudos to your cousin for the work on the Pijin translation.

Bro. May, nice to be back. Intensive period of taking care of my flock. Births, deaths, weddings, and just about every other imaginable life event. It’s good being

From back in the olden days when communism in Eastern Europe was the great enemy and preachers used to tell stories about the triumph of the Gospel in the face of such dark evil, I recall a story — perhaps apocryphal, who knows — about a man in Russia who received a Bible and became a Christian. He had two sons living in other cities… to one, he sent the Bible with a note expressing that it was true and Jesus really was God. The son, of course, also became a Christian. Having only one Bible, the man could only send the other son a letter telling him about his conversion and urging him to find a Bible and read it to find the truth of Jesus. The son received the letter, and went to a library. There, he of course could not find a Bible, but instead he found many communist books refuting Christianity. From these, he copied all of the scripture quotations and reviewed them, piecing together enough to understand the essentials, and he too found faith in Christ. This story was probably told to illustrate literally that “God’s word will not return to him void” or some such thing, and as I say, I can’t vouch for its veracity… but I place it squarely in the realm of plausibility.

The point of the whole story is to say that I wouldn’t go to the stake arguing that Reader’s Digest’s omission of a few genealogies is sufficient to render the text of Scripture impotent or otherwise worthless. Distilling the story arc of scripture in order to capture the grand themes is a helpful process. When I studied the Gospel of John, we were required to memorize the section headings from the UBS3 Greek New Testament, and were quizzed on which chapter a given heading was from. This distills the text down to the point where there isn’t anything original left… but it preserves the overall arc of the story — which is the point. You were pretty clear about how you use the condensed version, and I’ve no problem with that… I didn’t think you were going to construct sentence structure diagrams based on it.

I too am all for whatever it takes to gain the love of Scripture enough to be drawn to read it, and indeed, to live it. I could use a good dose of the same myself. This, I think, goes to the original heart of the post — the fact that some of what we’ve placed on and around the text to facilitate its organization, study, and interpretation has hindered us in the most important ways we could approach it — so we carve and dissect it instead of drinking it, and living it.

fwiw, my father-in-law also translated the New Testament into the language of a tribe in which he worked, many moons before I met him. I appreciate the translations we have, as I do each new attempt to translate the text into a version which can help unveil fresh meaning and relevance at an easy read. The fact that we have so many English translations today is largely testament to the fact that these translations can be undertaken at significant cost and a profit realized once the marketing and sales are carried out. Improvements are found in this exchange of course, but it’s hardly based on need in the same way at all.

I may have been feeling snarky about a particular audio set of the Bible, but as I said, it’s largely a matter of personal preference. I don’t like red lettering either, it’s too hard to read. Personal preference. I may like a different audio set of the Bible that someone else finds bland. Same Bible though… and I don’t want to move on to arguing which translation the apostles used or what colour the hymn books should be.

Still, I find myself unhappy with translations of John 3 that don’t catch the Greek wordplay that’s going on all over the place… or the way the NIV moves the apex of the chiastic structure of of John 1:1-18 by changing the sentence structure at verse 12. But seriously, I’m in the minority of people who get off on that stuff and it isn’t significantly changing doctrine. Of course, there’s the origin of that phrase “born again” that bugs me, but that’s a whole ‘nuther rant. ;^)

Peggy
on Thursday October 11, 2007 at 12:11 am

So…have either of you actually taken a look at it, or is the “thought” just too much for you? Contrary to Jefferson’s versions, I’m confident you will find all the parts that folks don’t like are still there–except, of course, for the incredibly repetitious listing of family names in Numbers…and the frequent phrase from 2 Kings concerning all of the accomplishments of the various horrid kings of Israel being recorded in the annals of the kings…the very parts that Monty Python like to make fun of–as in the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch… ;^)

So bear with me for one last comment: when it was first published in 1982, I was curious…and I just happened to be coaching our teens in Bible Bowl (a kind of quiz bowl competitive thing). Our text that year was Joshua, Judges and Ruth. After coaching and writing questions about every conceivable bit of data to be mined from these approximately 50 chapters, I thought a good test would be to read them from the Reader’s Digest Bible…surely the things they left out would just jump out at me…but, no. Didn’t miss a thing…breezed right through them so pleasantly, too!

My point, gentlemen, is this: we have all sorts of other tools that we use to make reading and understanding the Bible more approachable for the masses. We have Bible Story Books that retell all the stories–from stories for young children to Max Lucado! Some preach sermons and write commentaries going verse by verse putting their interpretation out there as if it is God-breathed. The best of them put in the caveat that their interpretation is “my best understanding at the current time,” or something to that effect. Humility is a good thing when approaching the Word of God….

So, from the conclusion of the Preface, we read these words from The Editors– after six long years of labor:

“Not in any way intended to replace the full Biblical text, which will always remain available, The Reader’s Digest Bible offers the general reader a more direct means of becoming intimately acquainted with the “whole” body of the Scriptures. It can be read more rapidly and with swifter comprehension, for inspiration, for instruction, even for pure heart-lifting enjoyment–the Bible is, after all, an unsurpassed collection of marvelous and stirring events linked to the divine will and purpose….an irresistible invitation to draw closer to the spiritual heart of the greatest book mankind possesses.”

…come to think of it, I just might switch my nightly reading to the boys (we’re in 2 Kings now…as you might have been able to tell from the reference) from The Message to the Reader’s Digest Bible…then I don’t have to edit on the fly to keep their attention up and the redundant phrases down…don’t tell me that you haven’t done that when reading through the whole text of the Bible…not just the Bible Story books…with young children!

Peace, brothers…really :^)

Peggy
on Thursday October 11, 2007 at 12:19 am

Ah, Brother…we were “quoth”ing at the same time…I see that you and I are on the same page after all, which is a comfort to me. Perhaps I did need a few more smiley faces…it’s been a little grim in my world this week…and I may have come with just a bit of “banter burnout” from the discussion of McLaren’s book over at Jesus Creed…mea culpa ;^)

O.k., since they haven’t created the “shame-faced” version of the smiley please insert it here for me. Peggy, I will give the RDCV a look. You can check back at my blog next month this time for my review. There’s a big part of me that struggles with the “adding to or taking from these words” notion. I understand that the geneologies are tiresome and the repetative refrains can become, well, repetative, but do they serve a purpose? I think so. To an oral society they provided bookmarks in the story. To a society of letters they provide us with names of real people and important markers of significance. One of my favorite examples of this is in Nehemiah 7-8. In 7 there is this lengthy geneology of names I can’t pronounce. In chapter 8 there is the tale of the renewal of the people. What people? Those that were just named in 7. Real people with real lives and real needs. Sometimes we forget that. If it’s “removed” are we missing something?

Looks like I’m going to be doing some bible buying this week – esv for the bedside, RDCV for the office shelf, gullah for wonderful cultural exposure. In other words, Bro. May, I will be feeding the profit hungry bible selling beast.

Peggy
on Friday October 12, 2007 at 11:35 am

“I realize these suggestions are contrary to what we’re saying about the text, but for most people, the intent of an audio set is fundamentally different.”

hehehe

Hope
on Friday October 12, 2007 at 12:54 pm

Peggy, I just got my copy of The Bible Experience today. You should check it out but I will consider listening to Bible Alive. I’m a bigger fan of NIV than NLT and I’m just getting used to TNIV. I think reading still would help me get an idea of how I like audiobible. I was interested in listening to King James Version of the bible but I think I will have to read the whole thing first. I get lost in the thees and thous.

Peggy
on Friday October 12, 2007 at 1:31 pm

Hope,

I didn’t fully disclose my history…I have a 48 cassette set (that tells you how old it is ;^) ) of the WorldAudio Dramatized NIV. My husband loaned the NT portion…and it was never returned… (may God bless it out there wherever it is :) ) So, when I went to get another set…one on CD…I chose Bible Alive.

By the way…it is a great practice to read along with the CD, if you can. Really gets the poetic flow and the pronunciations and pacing…

Actually, now that I think about it, these readings are another form of interpretation…hmmm…one more thing for the watch dogs to, well, watch (or should I say listen?)

Rich Mullins once said this:
In his article Making Being Made, Rich Mullins said that people …
– Speculate on it
– Pontificate in view of it
– Adulate it
– Attack it
– Adapt it
– Systemize it
– Criticize it
– Theorize it
– Ponder it
– Practice it

The best thing Rich says is this: “of course, what we make of the bible will never be as great a thing as what the bible will – if one lets it, make of us”.